Is Resistance Futile?

Is Resistance Futile? ©2016 Joan M. Newcomb, CPC

I woke this morning with the lyrics to "Do You Hear The People Sing" from Les Mis going through my head, and felt it was a commentary on the prevelant feeling throughout the world at this time.

"Do you hear the people sing? It is the song of angry men. It is the music of a people who will not be slaves again..."

People are angry. People are protesting. People are grieving. People are rebelling.

People are being called to action. They are speaking out. They are taking stands.

Aikido July 2002 Chateau de Clairvans, Gerard Blaze et Dominique

Then I remembered the scene in Les Mis, during the French Revolution, working class people manning the barricades. And they all got shot.

Is resistance futile? Do the big guys always win? Do our votes really count? Are our voices heard?

The energy of resistance usually attracts what you don't want. What you resist, persists. So from that perspective, resistance is futile. It perpetuates you in the reality that what you're resisting has power over you, is dominating you.

However, the energy of anger propels you out of the paralysis of fear. So if you are fighting something, that energy gives you the strength to take action and make changes.

The strongest stance, energetically, is non-resistance. That doesn't mean that you accept the unacceptable. But it means you can't be bullied or intimidated or triggered by whatever the other side does. You stand in your own power and negativity passes through without sticking.

Some forms of martial arts use non resistance to their advantage. When an opponent attacks, they respond in such a way that uses their energy against them. They step aside and the attacker falls over by their own force.

How can we possibly be non resistant to all the insanity going on right now? Wouldn't that be staying in our 'bubble' of privilege, or being in denial?

Non resistance doesn't mean not doing anything. It means to respond rather than react. It means standing back from all the noise and make conscious choices before taking action.

You can have strong feelings about things and still respond with non-resistance.

Bullies thrive on victims. Narcissists thrive on attention, even negative attention. Dominators aim to disempower people by getting them riled up and off balance.

We are all more powerful than we know. What is happening on the planet is that greater Consciousness is coming into form. That means your body is able to hold YOU, as Greater Consciousness, more than ever before.

Shift your perspective to your inner Essence and you will regain your balance.

Reasons versus Excuses

©2014 Joan M Newcomb

A while ago I learned that sometimes abusive behavior comes out of depression.  That is, the person who rages at you might actually be depressed (so much for thinking that depression is *repressed* anger).

That's great.  I mean, it's great to understand the reason, but it's not an excuse.  Understanding the reason for a behavior gives you the opportunity to remedy it.  Take steps to address it but it doesn't let you off the hook for having done it.

Reasons give you clarity, so you can take action.  Excuses are what you make to stay stuck.

Say you had a crappy history, that's great fertilizer for growth.  Understanding about dysfunctional patterns allows you to become conscious of behaviors so you can change them.  You're no longer a child, you may just feel like one when you get triggered.  Help is available, both visible and unseen.

You can't change the past, you can't change others, and you can change yourself, your actions and your viewpoint.

Your inner child really wants You, the wise Essence of who you really are, to drive the car.  If you're triggered, ground yourself in present time reality by talking (kindly and gently) to your child self, let them be in the safety seat behind You.

You can succeed in going where You want to go, in spite of your history, in spite of others out there still playing out old patterns.

Each one of us that stands in the present moment, breaking the pattern by choosing differently, creates healing for everyone.

Changing yourself creates change everywhere.

[When searching for an illustration for today, I found this instead, perhaps more fitting?]

Anger - a good thing

(c) 2009 Joan M. Newcomb

Lately, I've been feeling grouchy at times. It's surprising to me since I'm usually in a good mood. It's happening frequently enough that I've come to realize that it's part of my growth space, something I'll talk about later in this article.

When I do psychic readings, I sometimes notice varying shades of red in a client's aura. Red is life force energy. Sometimes it's dark red, which is frustration or blocked energy. Sometimes it's volcanic. Sometimes it's just a pure flow.

How comfortable we are with that vibration depends on our background and our natural tendencies. People who are Italian, or lawyers, or sales people, run this vibration with ease. Upper middle class WASPs and people who had an out of control parent tend to not feel safe with this energy, even if it's their own.

At it's essence it's an invigorating life force energy. It helps 'cut the crap', remove blocks and gives you the energy to go where you need to go or do what you need to do. In a dysfunctional state it's invasive and abusive.

Coming out of a dysfuctional childhood or marriage, we may have learned to repress our anger in order not to enrage the abuser. We may have learned to be invisible, or manically cheerful. We're so used to having our boundaries crossed by someone else's anger, we don't feel entitled to respond (abusers usually make you feel you deserved the abuse, and make themselves the victim if you do stand up for yourself).

As you recover from your childhood or marriage, it's a sign of growth when someone behaves badly towards you and you feel angry! Anger is a signal that your boundaries have been crossed. Anger is the inner you standing up for yourself.

Anger can also come up as part of your natural growth if you've been putting up with an intolerable situation for too long. It helps dissolve the blocks keeping you from moving forward.


I've been experiencing levels of frustration for the last couple of months. Energetically I can see the chunks of concrete floating in my aura! The image I get is of a star ship navigating it's way through space debris. Some of it is my own personal history and some of it is societal patterns. I know it's about dropping behaviors where I devalue myself and situations that undervalue me. (In Robert Scheinfeld's Phase 2 perspective, it's all me, inner and outer).


I've been reading a lot of people going through career transitions and the trend I see is towards right livelihood, doing work that is in integrity with their Essential Selves. If they're in a career or job that isn't right for them, they're feeling discontent. If their Essential Self created being laid off, they're having trouble finding work in their old field, because their Essential Self is wanting to steer them in the direction of what makes their heart sing!


A lot of people feel hesitant about taking the risk towards Right Livelihood because they think they can't make a living that way. In reality, their lives will be more abundant when they do. Prosperity always flows when you're in alignment with your Essential Self.


As you start to steer towards your Right Livelihood, where your Essential Self is calling you, you may feel some anger as you begin to pull out of old patterns. It's okay. You don't have to gnaw off the bindings or bark at those other characters in your story line you perceive. You can just imagine it as a 'force field' in front of your star ship (the edge of your aura) disintegrating whatever's been keeping you from boldly going where you're meant to go!


A simple navigational tool (one I believe I mentioned last week) -- to make decisions that are in your own best interest. If it's been so long since you've done that, it feels like this - you feel happy or elated when you go in that direction. You feel tense or dissatisfied (or 'the same') when you don't. Or that direction just looks and feels brightest, and the other way is duller or darker.


Try this for the next week, with each decision you make, go in the direction that feels brightest or makes you happy. And see how your entire Universe changes!

Fear and Anger

(c) 2009 Joan M. Newcomb

We're an Infinite Being that's created this Human Game for the fun of it. As Infinite, we're Infinitely Joyful, our Essence is ecstatic, all the time. So one of the fun aspects of the Human Game is all the different emotions we can feel!

A couple of these emotions are fear and anger. Physical bodies have the fear emotion as an alarm signal that they're in danger of being injured or dying. Anger is a reaction to fear and is an inspiration to either get the heck out of the situation or to defend or protect itself.

That's it.

When we're playing the Human Game at an unawake level, everything seems to reinforce the fact that we're powerless and in danger of dying. That we are our bodies, and when they go, we cease to exist. So the emotion of fear is a great reinforcement!

Look how fear has expanded in our world, in the news and in politics, to reinforce this aspect of the Human Game. We can be sitting in our homes snug and cozy with a cup of tea, and then turn on the news. Suddenly we're told that we could catch a flesh-eating bacteria if we haven't washed our hands, or the swine flu could be overrunning our community. An outbreak of an illness is a harbinger of a pandemic. There could be a few flakes of snow in the air and the news has turned it into a full scale blizzard.

I live on an island of 11,000 people accessible only by ferry, and we've police with drug sniffing dogs going up and down the ferry lines, and the coast guard circling our boats. Just in case "the terrorists" want a target 3,000 miles from New York City...

It's a great way to keep you off-kilter. Even if you were focused on reclaiming power from the illusion and waking yourself up to a more joyful way of living, you've totally forgotten about it now!

News and politics kindle anger, too. We're all supposed to have strong feelings against certain countries in the Middle East, or people who drive Hummers, or vote for the other guy.

Anger flares up when we feel our boundaries are crossed, and man, do we create boundaries wayyy out there so pritnear anyone could cross one at any time.

There's family patterns that reaffirm the fear and anger dance as well. Dad has a hard day of the office, is fearful of getting fired or not having enough money, comes home and yells at Mom, Mom snaps at the Kid and the Kid kicks the family dog. We carry such patterns into our work lives and other interactions. People make overly aggressive comments in meetings and emails. The recipients take it, fearful of losing their job in this economy (oh, the Economy, what a great fear game), then go home and yell at the wife, etc. etc. Fear and anger, fear and anger...

When we wake up to the fact we're an Infinite Being and that we actually created all of this down to the smallest detail, our first reaction may be anger.

Anger can be an effective way of getting unstuck, of clearing out limitations that have been blocking us from moving forward in our lives. But if you're reacting against a distortion, often your anger is distorted as well.

When we start to realize We created all the characters in our story line, that they're actually reflections of us (us in disguise), it becomes harder to react with anything but amusement or appreciation. Like a writer/producer/director admiring his newest film or play, you chortle with glee over every twist and turn in the story line. You absolutely love every character as well, no matter how flawed.

Fear and Anger become indicators that we've lost our focus, that we've temporarily forgotten our Infiniteness. As We grow in Awareness, You can actually get to the point where you're both amused *and* angry or fearful at the same time!

So I invite you to take a step back from the news and politics and view them from the bigger picture of the Human Game. And take a step back in your daily life to see how family patterns may be running both at home and at work. Appreciate the marvellous Game that this is, and see how you feel at the end of 7 days...

Email me and let me know!